


Little Reed

by ForeverChasingDreams



Series: Love After Love [1]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-25
Updated: 2014-03-25
Packaged: 2018-01-17 00:44:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1367650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForeverChasingDreams/pseuds/ForeverChasingDreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘The little reed, bending to the force of the wind, soon stood upright again when the storm passed over.’<br/>They meet Harry in stages, starting with the fresh-faced child and ending with the bent-not-broken man that stands with them today. It takes tears and lies and confessions and a trial that eats away at all of them, but they're still together, still a band, and they'll heal in time.</p><p>Or, I wanted an angsty little thing about the effects of long-term abuse on Harry and how the other boys react. None of this is graphic, it deals with events post-abuse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Little Reed

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is angsty and a little messed up, but I really wanted to examine this, to explore myself the victim's mentality and mainly the guilt of the other boys for their ignorance. It's not graphic in the slightest, despite the archive warning. I don't think the word rape is even used, and certainly nothing is ever described explicitly. Warning also for swearing.  
> But please, if you think anything will trigger you, don't read this.  
> I've never met Simon Cowell, but I highly doubt he is the sort of person to ever do this, and I am so sorry to him and his team, but I needed a well known figure, so . . .  
> Please don't show this to anyone related/connected to people in this story. It's for my enjoyment only.  
> Enjoy!

They meet Harry in stages, Zayn thinks later. Maybe Louis meets him first of them all, in a small toilet at the X Factor, when Harry is cute and curly and fresh-faced, and Louis is hyperactive and effeminate and young.

Maybe they all meet him properly when they’re put together at the end of boot camp, a shock addition to the line-up that has all of them in tears at some point

-or maybe Harry’s already starting to change.

 

Zayn used to think he knew Harry well. He knew the way his eyes lit up when he was happy, the way he laughed with all he had when he told a stupid joke that wasn’t even funny. He understood how Harry had a large heart with an open door that made all of them want to protect him and roll him up in bubble wrap for the rest of his life.

Then one morning he thinks that maybe none of them knew Harry at all, and the learning will take a lifetime of tears.

 

It’s not unusual for them to be up at the crack of dawn. They’re in LA, just Zayn, Harry and Liam. The others have chosen to remain home whilst the three of them meet with some writers to try and get started on their new album. They’re in the same hotel, rooms next to each other like old times because none of them relish being apart when they don’t have to – co-dependent and unashamed.

Zayn hears a disturbance next door, knows Harry’s in that room, and moves before he’s even thinking about it. It’s six am, and although Harry had retired to bed early the night before, making some crap excuse or other, Zayn still thinks it’s weird that the young boy is up voluntarily.

He knocks on the hotel room door, brushing his hair out of his face and yawning. He’s been up a while, a little jet-lagged since he only joined the other lads two days ago. He can hear two voices though, one unmistakably Harry’s, but the other? He recognises it.

He knocks again. There’s a scuffling, a harsh voice and some unknown words, and then Harry appears at the door, tired eyed and pale, but smiling nonetheless.

“Alright, Zayn?” he asks, trying to look relaxed but Zayn is very much aware of the tense lines of his body. Something is not right, something beyond Harry having a lady friend over that the media has not yet caught on about.

“What’s going on?” Zayn asks then, instead of answering the question. He peers around Harry but can’t see anyone else. “Who’re you talking to?”

Harry frowns, tries to look innocent. He can’t lie for shit. “No one,” he replies, and Zayn shakes his head.

“Don’t be stupid,” he says, barging past Harry and into the room. Harry follows, looking miserable and exhausted and so young that Zayn wants to curl him up in a duvet and never let him go. It’s not the first time Harry has looked like this, and it won’t be the last.

Harry says quietly behind him, “Zayn,” as if that would stop Zayn’s systematic search of the hotel room.

“Who’s here?” he asks again, wishing Harry would tell the truth, and wishing he himself would stop feeling the deep dread in his gut. The situation doesn't call for his actions, nor his worry, but something within Zayn is yelling that nothing is right, here. Harry needs help.

A handle turns, and Zayn spins to face the bathroom door. Harry grows paler next to him, and Zayn steps closer.

The door opens, and the man walks out, smiling easily at both of them as if it is a normal occurrence for him to be in Harry’s bathroom at six in the morning when they’re in LA.

“Morning, Zayn,” he says pleasantly. “Harry, I’ll be in contact later.”

Harry nods next to him, mutters a bye. Zayn doesn’t move at all until the man leaves the hotel room.

“Harry,” he says lowly, turning to face the boy. “Why was Simon Cowell in your room this morning?”

Harry tries to smile, the expression twisting his face into a form unrecognisable. “He has an early flight this morning,” he explains, “and wanted to chat about the album quickly before he goes.”

Zayn shakes his head, doesn’t believe him for a second. It’s a reasonable excuse, probably why Simon thought it would be best to be open about his presence, but no. He thinks back to the last few years, to the appearance of Simon everywhere they went, to Harry frequently disappearing to LA instead of going home to his family, to Harry’s long silences at infrequent times, and he says,

“No.”

Harry doesn’t look at him.

“Why was Simon in _your_ hotel room?” Zayn asks again, his voice growing quieter and worry seeping through every pore. Maybe he’s overreacting, seeing things that aren’t there, but he can’t shake the feeling that he’s a little bit _right_ to be concerned.

“I told you-” Harry starts to answer, but Zayn steps forward and grabs his covered wrist, stopping him in his tracks. Zayn doesn’t miss the wince, either, when he applies a small amount of pressure, and with his heart in his mouth, Zayn draws up Harry’s sleeve as far as it can go. Harry doesn’t protest.

“What is this?” Zayn asks shakily, looking at the mottled bruises on Harry’s arm that form a patchwork quilt against the pale skin. Harry is shaking his head, biting his lip and looking so immensely fragile.

“An accident,” Harry says roughly, but he doesn’t pull away.

“That’s not an accident,” Zayn tells him, pulling up Harry’s jumper and t-shirt and wanting to throw up.

“Zayn,” Harry murmurs quietly, voice so young and small. He lets Zayn slip his tops over his head.

“Jesus, Haz,” Zayn says, looking at the continuation of the bruises. “What the fuck?”

“He doesn’t normally, he was frustrated-” Harry starts to babble, and Zayn tenses immediately when Harry’s words filter through. Harry emits a low moan, turning away and hugging his arms against himself.

“Harry,” Zayn says hesitantly. “Did Simon do this to you?”

“No, no, no,” Harry mumbles, and Zayn doesn’t know what to do besides grab Harry in an embrace and tug him down onto the floor, clutching the younger boy to him and closing his eyes.

Harry shakes in his arms, and Zayn becomes aware of tears slipping down the boy’s face as he cries silently, heartbreakingly in his arms.

 

Harry wonders later how it lasted two years and yet fell apart in a single moment.

 

Harry quietens down after a while, and Zayn chances his voice.

“Was I right?” Zayn asks, not letting Harry go. “Was it Simon?”

Harry is slow to respond, still fragile in Zayn’s arms, tall and yet so tiny curled up against him. “Yes,” he says eventually, and Zayn breathes a deep breath.

“Okay,” he says. “How long?”

Harry shakes his head, and Zayn wonders if it’s a hard question to answer. He doesn’t want to think about why.

“Why?” he asks instead, because he needs to know _something_ , needs some information to decide what to do. Do you call the police in times like this?

Harry shrugs. “Likes the power,” he mutters quietly. “Said he loved me,” he admits, his voice a whisper Zayn barely catches.

“What?” Zayn breathes, because _that?_ That is so much worse than a few bruises, and now Zayn is lost completely, doesn’t know what to do to even help Harry if Simon-

No. Not to Harry.

“What did Simon do?” Zayn chokes out, wondering which answer he would prefer, wonders whether he would believe any answer that Harry gave now that didn’t include the word- No.

Harry shakes his head, breathing fast again and becoming hysterical.

“Okay,” Zayn says soothingly, running a hand through Harry’s hair and pulling him up to help him onto the bed. “Okay, Haz, you’re alright.”

Harry turns his face into the bed, and Zayn lets him hide in the pillow and then eventually in dreams.

 

Maybe that’s when he starts to get to know Harry, gets to know his tears.

 

Zayn calls Liam, unwilling to leave Harry and needing another person’s help. He doesn’t want to explain it, doesn’t know how, but Harry is asleep and drained and _hurt_ , and Zayn is so lost right now.

Liam pales as Zayn relates the events of the morning, glancing at Harry’s closed eyes and looking increasingly ill.

“Are you sure?” he asks, and Zayn shakes his head.

“He won’t tell me,” he answers, but the both of them know that just because they don’t want to face up to it and Harry can’t admit it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.

“What do we do?” Liam asks, and Zayn wants to explode.

“I don’t know,” he hisses, upset and irrationally angry and desperate. “That’s why I called you.”

Liam nods, gaze far away. “We need to report this,” he says. “But the media . . .”

“He’ll be hounded,” Zayn finishes. “But this can’t go on, Liam.”

“Will it?” Liam asks, cocking his head. “We don’t even know if it’s a one-time thing, Zayn.”

“I don’t think it is,” Zayn answers, remembering with a heavy heart Harry’s words.

_He said he loved me_

Maybe the cracks in Harry’s armour start to open from that day, when Liam and Zayn hold Harry as he admits later in a shaky voice that it had been happening for years. They don’t get a confession as to what, but Harry allows them to strip him out of his clothes and into pyjamas and check his injuries, and if Zayn has to turn away to hide the tears as he catches sight of the pale bruises and red marks on Harry’s inner thighs? Well, no one in that bathroom really can blame him.

 

Maybe they get to know him more as they tell the police, Harry being separated off from them to give a statement and talk to a police counsellor and they themselves give their accounts.

Maybe they don’t, because Harry comes back with tear stained cheeks and bright eyes, but tells them that everything’s fine and he really just wants to be left alone.

It’ll take years, Zayn thinks.

 

They fly back to the UK before the news breaks worldwide and before Simon is even arrested. Harry’s family has been told by the police, and Zayn and Liam have themselves rung Louis and Niall. Louis had sworn and cried and pleaded with Zayn to admit he was lying, and Zayn had never felt so torn as he repeated over and over again that he wasn’t.

Niall, according to Liam, had been mostly silent.

“Why didn’t he tell us?” he’d said at the end, and it’s a question that plagues them all for months to come.

 

Harry gets shuffled away by his mum, red-eyed and weepy and still beautiful, whilst the rest of them crash at Louis’ place, quiet and still and fucked up more than they’d like to admit. They sleep in the lounge, all together, because none can face the demons at night alone, devils with faces like angels, with Harry’s tears and begging voice.

 _“Why didn’t you do anything?”_ the apparitions ask, and none of them have an answer.

 _“Why didn’t we know?”_ they ask themselves, and it tears them apart.

 

Harry hasn’t told anyone what happened exactly apart from the police, according to his mum, who calls the next day. She says he’s silent and sleeps a lot, unwilling to face the world. She doesn’t say, _why didn’t you look after him?_ and nor does she accuse them of anything, but they don’t need the words to know the truth.

 

The papers run the story the next day, and it’s international news. _Simon Cowell accused of child abuse and sexual assault. The X Factor Secret_ , one headline reads. Many of them speculate that One Direction will fall apart now; they say it’s impossible for the band to carry on after such a revelation. Zayn ignores these, pretends they’re all whole and healthy and alive, and thinks fiercely that nothing will tear them away from each other.

The articles on Harry are harder to take, as are the experts called in on TV programmes to discuss the after-effects of such abuse. No one knows the whole story, only Harry and the police – and Simon himself, of course – but it doesn’t stop them speculating.

Intensive therapy, they say. Guilt, shame, and blame, says another. Unlikely to ever form lasting relationships again. Trust issues.

Zayn turns them off. Louis turns them on. It’s a kind of torture that all of them think they must face. Penance, maybe, for failing Harry so spectacularly. So they read the articles and watch the programmes and ring Anne daily for news, and wish they had Harry in front of them instead of so far away.

 

Harry comes back to London a week after the news breaks to carry on writing and recording. Anne is quietly furious, and accompanies him, staying with Gemma when Harry refuses to let her move in with him.

He’s not back to normal; no longer pretending to be, anyway, because all of them wonder how much he’d been hiding for so many years. He tries though, laughing and joking and running when he can’t handle it, and all of them feel a little helpless because they don’t know how to help. He has a psychiatrist now who works with him twice a week, according to Anne, but he still seems lost and broken.

“I want things to go back to normal,” Harry says to Zayn and Louis when writing one day. His voice is low and Zayn’s not sure they’re even meant to hear it, but he can’t leave Harry hanging.

“When you were hurting?” Zayn says, eyebrows raised, the words blunt but the tone soft.

Harry shrugs. “No different from now,” he answers, and Zayn shuts his eyes briefly, heart aching for Harry. Louis reaches out slowly, carefully, to take Harry into his arms. They’re all a little hesitant with physical contact now, not wanting Harry to feel forced or pressurised or uncomfortable, even if Harry seemed to live with it okay for years.

“You’re not alone anymore,” Louis tells him fiercely, kissing the top of Harry’s head, and the boy flinches minutely.

“Don’t,” Zayn says to Louis, because Zayn could see the reaction but Louis, above him, could not. Louis looks puzzled. “Don’t kiss him like that.”

“It’s okay,” Harry says, and of course he thinks it is, he’s been lying to the world about his feelings for so long; he’s used to being scared or unhappy.

“It’s not,” Zayn says. “Tell us if you don’t like something.”

Louis realises the situation now, and nods against Harry. “He’s right,” he murmurs to Harry. “We don’t want to hurt you.”

“I’m not broken,” Harry says in frustration, pulling away from Louis and clutching his arms around himself. He looks like a wild, wounded, animal, strong and weak at the same time – desperate, maybe. Cornered.

“We know,” Zayn says, but it doesn’t mean anything, the words, and it won’t reassure Harry in the slightest. What else could he say? He doesn’t have a psychiatry degree.

“No, you don’t,” Harry retorts, his voice getting louder. “None of you do. You have no fucking idea.”

Zayn looks at Louis helplessly.

“Don’t do that!” Harry cries. “Don’t look at each other as if to say, what do we do about the mad one? I’m not fucking broken!”

“Okay, Haz,” Louis says slowly. “We know you’re not. We just want to help.”

“Well you can’t,” Harry snaps, his voice tired and small now. “No one can.”

 

Harry goes out that night to a club, with Nick Grimshaw as a companion. All of them think it’s a terrible idea; Grimmy’s great for a laugh but the two of them always attract paps whenever they go out. Harry really doesn’t need the attention right now, not when he seems to be barely hanging on by a thread.

Zayn offers to go out too, as does Louis, both of them painfully aware this is another way through which Harry is proving to them that he’s not broken.

Harry refuses, pitches a fit, says he’s twenty years old and he can go to a club by himself, has done for the last few years when no one knew any better. It’s a stark reminder that, whilst to them this is new and scary and heart-breaking, to Harry it’s just old news, part of his life. He’s been living with Simon’s actions since the beginning, and Zayn thinks that maybe he can cope. Maybe they’re coddling him too much.

 

Harry comes home that night, though, surprisingly sober and quiet. He doesn’t go to his flat. Instead, he lets himself into Louis’ place, where all of them are still staying. Zayn lies still as he hears Liam get up to greet him, and wishes he could block his ears so that he doesn’t have to hear Harry’s fractured voice.

“This has been my life for years,” he admits softly, and Zayn can just about see Liam pull Harry into a bar stool and grab him some water. “Why am I struggling now?”

Zayn bites his lip, tastes blood and relishes in the pain.

“You don’t have to hide anymore,” Liam tells him, and maybe it’s an answer or maybe it’s not, but Harry nods anyway.

“I hate this,” he says, and his voice cracks halfway through. Zayn wants to jump up and cradle Harry until he never has to face the world again, but he can’t do that, can’t take away the pain of memories.

Liam instead pulls Harry to him, lets him bury his head in the crook of his shoulder, and Zayn can see Harry shaking slightly.

“He ruined me,” Harry cries, oh so quietly. “He ruined everything.”

Liam only tells Harry to hush, rocking him gently from side to side and wiping tears from his eyes. Zayn turns his face into a cushion, swallows the lump in his throat, and closes his eyes. They deserve their privacy.

 

Simon’s charged with a list of things, including sexual assault and molestation, and his trial date is set for two months’ time. He gains bail at a ridiculous sum that is paid instantaneously, on the grounds that he doesn’t travel abroad. Liam immediately organises a long-term trip to LA for all of them, and Zayn thinks Harry is grateful even if he doesn’t admit it. Anne doesn’t come, but she says a tearful goodbye to Harry and a promise that she’ll see him in two months. His psychiatrist gets the plane after them, paid for by Louis and accompanied by Lou Teasdale, who is a pillar of support for all of them.

 

Harry meets up with Taylor regularly when they’re in LA, seeing her after recording and even inviting her when writing. Their relationship had been set up initially by their respective managements, ideal for publicity, but they’d both stayed friends and Zayn wonders if it’s because Harry feels safe with her. She’s small and young and blonde and very much female. Harry towers over her, but sometimes Zayn thinks he looks tiny in comparison now, because Taylor has a presence whereas Harry seems to want to hide in the background.

 

Harry starts to come into himself in the LA sun though, laughing with Taylor and playing Fifa with the lads and going out to the pub and speaking politely to the paps instead of trying to hide himself. He has nightmares at night, but they’re silent and Zayn worries somehow that they would never know what had been going on if he hadn’t by accident caught Simon in the act. Then he thinks, how many times had they just missed it? How many times had they been out with girlfriends or clubbing or even just watching TV, whilst Harry had been suffering so close by, and so quietly?

Why didn’t he ever tell them?

 

Maybe they get to know Harry completely in the trial, closed to the public and to reporters, but open to the One Direction team and their families. Maybe that’s when they see the real him, when they begin, over the days of testimonies and arguments, to understand what Harry had been through.

“Boot camp,” Harry answers, when they ask when it started. “He wanted- he asked to see me alone at the end of a day, and then got me to-”

He stops. When they ask if Simon sexually assaulted him then, he nods, and Zayn wants to throw up. Harry had been sixteen, barely legal, and betrayed by someone in a position of authority.

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?” is the next question, and Harry doesn’t look up, doesn’t connect with the sharp gazes of the band who are all asking him, silently, with their eyes, _why didn’t you trust us enough?_

“I didn’t think anyone would believe me,” Harry answers quietly.

It’s a fair point, maybe, at that time, but as their fame grew and they all got closer, brothers more than friends, related to each other in everything but blood, why did he not say then?

“I got used to the secret,” Harry continues, clenching his fists and digging his nails in. “He used to tell me- He’d say I was nothing, pathetic. That no one would believe me over him. That I was worth nothing more than a-”

He takes a breath, says nothing more, but Zayn can fill in the gaps. _Whore_ , Simon would have said. _Tart. Hooker_. He would have beaten Harry down to a pulp with words and nothing more, made Harry think that he deserved it, that he was pathetic for it all. And the media would have made it worse, presented Harry as a womaniser and slut, made it so Harry himself began to believe his own image, until he didn’t trust anyone enough to tell them the truth.

Zayn wishes he had a gun right now, and he’s never thought that before.

 

Zayn goes out after the first day of Harry’s testimony, straight to his normal tattoo parlour. He gets a gun tattooed onto his chest – a water gun, if any of the press ask – and it’s a reminder to him to never ever let this happen again. Never again will he be so blind as to let a friend slip through the cracks. Never again will he be helpless.

 

Harry goes back to Louis’ with them, talks to his psychiatrist for an hour on the phone in the bathroom, takes a half hour long shower, then crawls out with wet hair and red skin and curls up next to Niall on the sofa, who immediately wraps an arm around him.

“Ask,” Harry says quietly. Zayn looks at Liam. None of them say a word. “I know you have questions,” Harry adds. “I won’t break.”

Niall doesn’t ask a question, but says instead, “I wish you had told us.”

Harry nods, his gaze a little distant. “Sorry,” he says.

“Don’t apologise,” Louis tells him sharply. “None of this is your fault.”

“I should have told someone the first time,” Harry argues, but his heart isn’t in it.

“You should never have been in that position,” Zayn informs him gently. “It’s no one’s fault but Cowell’s.”

Harry nods again, but all of them know it’s not that simple. Years of lies and pain and assault isn’t going to be overcome at once.

“How often?” Liam asks after a moment of silence. He doesn’t clarify any further, but they all know what he means.

Harry shrugs. “Depended on where we were,” he answers. “In London or LA? Whenever he could. Tour was . . . safer.”

Zayn blows out a breath, wishes he could time travel, contemplates getting a Tardis on his arm now as well.

“Did he hurt you?” Liam asks, then backtracks as if he can’t quite believe he uttered that aloud. “I mean- You don’t have to answer that. I- It was a stupid question-”

“It’s okay,” Harry says, interrupting him, but his tone isn’t steady, and he can’t look at any of them.

“No,” Louis says firmly. “You don’t need to answer anything you don’t want to.”

“I’ll need to in court tomorrow,” Harry points out. “And- I want to. I think. I need to talk about this.”

“We love you no matter what,” Niall says strongly, because it needs saying and Harry needs reminding.

“He used to say he loved me,” Harry says in a low voice, eyes far away and shadowed.

“Harry-” Zayn says.

“I know he didn’t,” Harry carries on. “He said he loved me in spite of it all. Despite the fact that I was a- a-, whatever. That no one else ever would.”

“That’s a lie,” Louis tells him, and it’s supposed to come out as ferocious, Zayn thinks, but his voice is so anguished that instead it is almost a plea.

“We will always love you,” Zayn reassures him. “So will your family.”

Harry says, “yeah,” and Zayn wants to hit something all over again. They’re curled up on the sofa, all touching and interlocking, the soft light of the lamp illuminating their faces but shadowing their expressions, and they’re so close and yet Harry seems so far away from the rest of them. An angel, maybe. Untouchable now. Able to observe but not participate, ripped from real life by the actions of one disturbed, disgusting man.

Harry continues. “He didn’t hurt me a lot,” he says. “Sometimes he was too rough or- or quick. And sometimes it was deliberate, when he was frustrated. But mostly he was kind of- nice. It was- I knew it was wrong,” Harry utters. Zayn is torn inside when he notices the tears down Harry’s face. He wants him to stop, wants to cease the torturous retelling, but he thinks that maybe Harry needs this.

Harry starts again after a pause. “It felt wrong,” he says. “I knew he shouldn’t be doing it, but I didn’t think anyone would believe me. And, like- sometimes I’d react to it,” he huffs in a breath, and Zayn feels the tears on his own cheeks, “and then I’d think, what if people thought I just wanted it? What if I was really a- a whore, or something? And he was kind, in the beginning. Gentle, like a father or uncle or something, and I didn’t know what to do.”

“He was wrong,” Liam says softly, and Zayn marvels at the fact that he isn’t in tears, but his voice isn’t exactly steady either. “You did the best you could, and you survived, Haz.”

“And now the world knows,” Harry says bitterly.

“Now we know,” Louis corrects him. “And you’re not alone.”

 

Cowell’s defence seems to be focused around the principle that Harry’s lying. There’s no proof whatsoever of any illicit behaviour between the two, other than Harry’s testimony, and the statements of Zayn and Liam who had seen the initial bruises. There’s evidence that places Simon at various hotel rooms and places where Harry is, but no one can prove that Simon acted inappropriately. He’s commonly considered to be their mentor, after all. There’s no reason for him not to be routinely meeting with them.

It makes Zayn’s blood boil, hearing Simon’s account of the events, listening to the oh so innocent tones and the lies and the hideous accusations they make against Harry, stating that the fame at such a young age has gone to his head, that it’s done for publicity, that he’s a compulsive attention-seeker.

Harry cries more than he laughs these days. He barely leaves Louis’ flat, and he calls or personally meets with his psychiatrist every day, and Cowell has the nerve to accuse him of making it up?

Zayn wishes his tattoo is real.

 

Harry fractures and rebuilds himself on a daily occurrence. Some days he eats; some days he throws up in the toilet and curls up to sleep on the cold tile floors. They feel helpless.

 

Someone testifies in court that they’d seen Harry and Simon together on the evening of their MSG concert. Zayn feels sick. He remembers that night; it was one of the best of their lives, exciting, amazing, and so awe-inspiring that none of them had slept.

He wonders if Harry remembers it the same, or if to him it was simply another day in an endless stream of nightmares.

 

Zayn goes home for a couple of days. He’s talked to his mum on Skype a lot, but it’s the first time he’s seen her face to face since the news broke. She’s dry-eyed but sad; all of them love Harry, the sweet baby of the band. 

He lies next to her on the sofa at night, warm and safe, wondering if Harry ever feels that way anymore. He asks his mum, “Why didn’t we know?” in a quiet broken voice, and she has no answer for him.

 

The court asks Harry, “Did Simon ever hurt you deliberately?”

and Harry says, “Yes,” as if the answer is easy and obvious, and Niall next to Zayn gets up and leaves.

“Can you give us an example of when and how?”

Zayn shuts his eyes and covers his ears and thinks he’s selfish, because he has to listen but Harry had to _live_ it alone for years.

 

Louis doesn’t cope well. He goes out and gets drunk one night with Eleanor, and she brings him back with guilt on her face and says, “I couldn’t stop him from drinking.”

They assure her it’s okay, that they’ll look after their wild-eyed bandmate, who is shaky and mad and loud.

“We fucked up,” Louis keeps saying. “What the fuck use are we?”

He’s slurring, almost incoherent, but the general gist gets through as he rants and raves and, eventually, sobs. Liam puts him to bed with a bottle of water and a couple of paracetamol, and they all pretend they don’t notice Harry watching sadly from the door.

 

Louis goes home for a few days, and comes back calmer. Liam talks to Harry alone one evening, and the next announces the start of group therapy for them. Zayn wants to know what the hell a psychiatrist could tell them that they don’t already know, and he wonders why Harry even agreed to it but-

-but Zayn had said not long ago to himself that nothing could tear this band apart, and now it is.

They need the help.

 

“I don’t blame you,” Harry says slowly in one of their sessions. Zayn looks at him closely, and thinks, _yeah, okay, I believe you_.

“Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t,” Louis says back, and Niall puts a hand on his knee.

“I never did and I won’t,” Harry answers, with a shrug. “I blamed myself and now I blame Cowell, but it was never your fault.”

“We lived with you for most of the time, Haz,” Louis tells him quietly. “We never noticed a fucking thing.”

“I hid it well,” Harry says, looking Louis straight in the eye. “It’s okay.”

It’s not, but maybe they’re getting there.

 

They learn over time what Harry likes and what he can’t stand. He doesn’t tell them, doesn’t think it’s that big of a deal considering he’s already put up with these day-to-day activities for years, but they’re determined now. Nothing that makes Harry even the slightest bit uncomfortable is allowed.

So they don’t kiss his forehead. They stop slapping his bum as a joke. They let him enter a bedroom last instead of first, and they never trap his legs down when they cuddle.

It’s a learning curve, and Zayn doesn’t want to contemplate why Harry hates all of these things, and can’t stop his mind from conjuring up images of Harry, young and helpless and alone-

-No.

They learn. They don’t understand, but they don’t need to.

 

The trial comes to an end, and Simon is found guilty of the charges. Zayn doesn’t listen closely, fixates instead on Harry who sits with his mum, step-dad, and sister. He looks small and tired and doesn’t, no matter what the films say, miraculously become better when the long prison sentence is given.

It doesn’t matter. They have time.

 

They go back to recording and writing. Harry attends most days; on days he doesn’t, his mum rings to say he’s having a bad day and to leave him alone. It feels a bit like they’re five again, with his mum reporting his illness, but they appreciate the knowledge. They’re all dispersing back to their flats or houses now, and Harry was the first to go, moving back to his own home with his mum moving in to keep an eye on him.

Some days he comes in despite the badness, and they all make sure he’s never alone but that he has space. They bring endless supplies of tea and biscuits and chocolate, and they keep the topics light and airy. They’re becoming experts at navigating Harry’s moods.

 

He presents them with a song, three weeks after the trial ended and the day after a _very very bad day_ , when Harry had struggled into the studio in the morning only to freak at every touch and scream the place down with yells and curses and fear. They’d called his mum.

Anyway, he sings it to them in a low, rough, hoarse voice, not recovered after the exertions of the previous day, and they all listen. It’s a tale of lost innocence and hurt, and it’s a little outside of their normal tunes, but they squeezed _Don’t Forget Where You Belong_ into the last album despite its differences, and they think they can put this one in here.

It’s painful to listen to, the song, because it’s honest and true and real, but it ends with hope and that’s the message they want to send to the world, they think, with their new album, _Believe In Us_.

It’s not about other people, even if the title sounds a little big headed. It’s about them, about relying on themselves and fighting their way through, and staying true to themselves as friends and brothers no matter what.

Harry names his song _Little Reed_ , and Zayn is confused enough by the name and its references in the song that he goes home that day and googles the two words.

 _Oh,_ he thinks when he clicks on a link. He reads the quotation and says, “Oh, Haz,” aloud to his empty flat.

_‘The little reed, bending to the force of the wind, soon stood upright again when the storm passed over.’_

Bent but not broken. It’s fitting.

 

Things don’t heal at once. They take weeks off from performing and promos, concentrating instead of perfecting the album, safe at home with each other and families and psychiatrists.

 

“Can you see why they’re hurt?” their psychiatrist asks Harry at one of their group sessions. Harry nods, looks small, and Zayn wants to interrupt, yell at the woman that none of this was Harry’s fault and to stop making it sound like it was.

“You all rely upon each other when you travel, right?” she continues, “and each and every one of you has at some point said you’re like brothers more than friends. And then, suddenly, they learn that they never knew something fundamental about you, Harry, and everything gets pulled into question.”

That’s nothing they don’t already know, but maybe they need to hear it themselves, phrased like that. She gave voice to their unspoken hurt, and Zayn nods slightly to himself.

How could they be brothers if Harry never trusted them?

But Zayn doesn’t blame Harry either; none of them do, he knows. Harry did the best he could in an impossible situation, and they blame themselves more than anything else.

“It wasn’t his fault,” Louis snaps, always ready to defend and bite; the fierce mother bear whilst Liam is perhaps the mother hen.

“Of course it’s not,” the psychiatrist says. “But my job is to work with all of you, which means making sure everyone understands each other’s emotions right now. And the four of you?” she waves at them. “You’re angry at yourselves and at Cowell, and you’re hurt, too. Am I right?”

Liam nods unwillingly, thoughtful. Harry looks at the psychiatrist, not them.

“Do you have anything to add to this?” she asks of them, cocking her head.

There’s a beat of silence. Then Zayn decides that they’re never going to get anywhere without honesty, and speaks up. “I’m frustrated,” he says quietly. “I feel helpless. Nothing we do- We can’t take away what happened, and I don’t know how to help.”

“Yeah,” Niall says softly. “I love you, Haz,” he adds, “but I don’t know how to act.”

“I’m not a child,” Harry says loudly. “I’m not going to break, either. You don’t need to act any different.”

“We kind of do,” Zayn tells him gently. “We don’t want to hurt you more.”

Harry shakes his head, looks mulish and annoyed. “Nothing’s changed,” he says.

“Of course it has,” Liam replies.

Everything’s changed.

 

It takes weeks, months, before they go back to work fully, rescheduling their 2014 tour to 2015 instead. The days run together quickly until the time is upon them, and Zayn is scrabbling madly to pack everything.

They meet at the airport, bright and early. They’ve said goodbye to family and friends, and now it’s just the five of them again, facing the big bad world as a brotherhood that has slowly been reforming as time passes.

Harry’s not better, not truly. He sleeps badly, freaks out silently at small things, and talks to his psychiatrist twice a week. None of them are whole again; all just a little fractured by past secrets and glued together with the help of weekly therapy sessions.

“Ready?” Paul asks, as the time to board approaches. The five of them stand together, Harry in the middle, protected and safe, and Liam nods.

“Ready,” he confirms.

 

They meet Harry in stages; meet the curly haired child first, meet the masked teen second, meet the bent-not-broken man last. But they always knew him, knew the smile and the eyes, knew the love his heart could hold.

They were always just five boys in a wild situation, with no one but each other to help them through.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Please do leave a comment to let me know your thoughts. I may continue in this verse at a later date, depending on its reception and my will, I guess.  
> The quote in the fic and used in the title is from Aesop's fable, The Oak and The Reed


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